Pobull Fhinn

Stone Circle, North Uist

Situated on the other side of the hill from Barpa Langass; you
have a choice of going over the top (difficult, but probably rewarding) or round the side
(easier but longer). The circle is built on an artificial platform created by digging away
part of the side of the hill, and depositing the excavated earth on the lower part of the
slope, thus making a (fairly) level surface. It's the sort of detail I would have missed,
but when you look at the scale of the site and realise the engineering involved in
building a level platform out of the side of a hill, you can't fail to be impressed. The
circle itself is a pointy egg shape (technically speaking) and is about 60 feet across its
longest axis (see overall view photo). It was quite overgrown with bracken when we visited
- some stones were virtually hidden. There are some good-sized stones here the largest of
which is about 5 feet high. It's the setting of the whole site, though, that really takes
your breath away; hence the panoramic photos. The views all around were incredible. (In
fact it was Aubrey Burl's description which really made us make the effort
to get there - he said it had one of the loveliest settings of any circle and he was
right.) The weather was actually a lot brighter than the pictures would lead you to
believe - it was my timing that was at fault! We stayed there for hours and hours and had
one of the most memorable visits to a circle that we've ever had. In fact we very nearly
missed the ferry back, but were saved by a timely lift from some local people who got us
to the dock just in time. Definitely worth the effort (a total of about 1.5 miles walk
from the road) and the cost (the ferry was about 7 return). We can't wait to go
back.

Access:
Situated on North Uist, near Loch Langass. We got the ferry from Leverburgh, on
Harris, to Newtonferry (a.k.a. Otternish - this caused some confusion, as Caledonian
Macbrayne, the ferry company, refer to it as Otternish, while all the maps we had called
the place Newtonferry. when we pointed this out to one of the ferry crew, he smiled and
said "Oh, so you noticed then.".) From the ferry, it was about a ten mile bus
ride - the bus doesn't have a particularly strict timetable and it will usually wait until
the ferry has arrived before setting off. The driver let us off near the site; there's not
a bus stop as such, but most people know where things are and the best way to approach
them so it's always worth asking. Situated on the other side of the hill from Barpa
Langass Click here for full page map
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Rating: General Impression 4, Ambience 4, Access 2

Text and photos on this page by and copyright of Alastair
Fletcher and Jocasta Barrett

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